(Kirby Lee-USA TODAY Sports)
Today’s big winner: Jim Kelly
In a week full of terrible front page headlines, this refreshing news was incredibly well timed.
The executive director of the New York Head and Neck Institute at Lenox Hill Hospital in Manhattan released a statement Wednesday that the former Buffalo Bills quarterback “has no evidence of the [sinus] cancer” that he had been receiving radiation and chemotherapy treatments for over the past three months.
Since taking his fight public following a recurrence of the disease in March, “Kelly Tough” has become an inspirational slogan for both his family and for thousands of other families who’ve gone through something similar. The willingness of Kelly’s wife Jill and daughter Erin to document the good, bad and the ugly of their struggle on social media has made plenty of people who’ve never met the man feel like they have a personal stake in his recovery.
As anyone who has watched someone close to them deal with a terminal illness knows, there’s a constant give and take between hoping and praying for the best but bracing yourself for the worst. When a tired but enthusiastic Kelly appeared at NFL Hall of Fame weekend several weeks ago, he had completed treatment and was waiting several weeks to take this week’s test. It was hard not to wonder if this was the final time we’d see him on stage in Canton.
After receiving the positive scan results, Jill Kelly was guardedly optimistic in an Instagram message Wednesday,
“We have come away from our checkup visit in NYC encouraged and hopeful,” she posted. “Preliminary scan results have necessitated the need for biopsies to be done in order to confirm what we hope to be true…that the cancer has been eradicated. We will not know the outcome until this procedure is completed. And so… We continue to PRAY, rejoice, live…wait and trust GOD who holds ALL things together.”
While Kelly has inspired so many people as a cancer patient, he stands to do so much more as a cancer survivor. State of mind is so incredibly important when dealing with a disease that saps your strength and constantly threatens your mortality.
If Kelly’s sheer presence as an example that there’s a potential positive ending can serve as some sort of motivation for the thousands of people who’ll face similarly grueling treatments, this great news affects so many more people than just him.
More of today’s big winners:
Michael Jordan: He was better at dunking than he is at being dunked, but the NBA legend’s ice-bucket challenge video was still pretty fun to see.
Stephon Marbury: The former Knicks star will act in a Chinese theater production about his life playing basketball in that country.
Aggressive fish: This bold grouper attacked a shark, presumably in response to years of deep sea oppression.
Dallas Cowboys: The NFL’s most valuable franchise is now worth $3.2 billion, ensuring that at least they’ll place first in something in 2014.
Read the Morning Win every weekday morning.
